Simple Downton pleasure

Yes, it's finally time to comment on the Downton film (or movie). I've watched it twice now, and though I liked it a lot I'm still a bit torn about it.

First off: if you are a Downton fan, you will enjoy this film. If possible, go and see it in the cinema: not because it necessarily has to be seen on the big screen, but because you will then be in the company of other fans and get a warm, fuzzy feeling of sharing experiences as the audience around you laughs affectionately at Molesley and at the Dowager Countess's witty lines, gasps when Andy behaves even more stupidly than usual or goes "aaah" when Thomas finally gets a kiss from a nice bloke. You will not leave the cinema sad, angry or betrayed, and that, in these times of fandom discontent, is worth quite a lot.

In some ways, though, I can't help thinking this film is a bit of a wasted opportunity. Reviews have described it as exactly like the TV series, and in a way it is, but for most of the time it's not like the TV series at its best. I wouldn't take a Downton newcomer to see this film. If you want to give them a taste of what the show is like, it's better to go for one of the early episodes (and I say that although I have issues with series one) or maybe the first episode of series two. Downton was always at its most thrilling when exploring the relationships between its main characters: love affairs; family ties; friendships; professional relationships; tensions and bonding between employers and staff etc. In the film, there is little room for this kind of interactions, because a royal visit steals most of the limelight.

Yes, as I predicted, the film is, for the most part, a prime example of Simple Downton. We have glamour, we have beautiful dresses and palatial environments, we have high jinks in the servants' quarters. The King and Queen are coming to Downton Abbey. The Crawleys are nervous about pulling it off, and Mary asks Carson to come back for the occasion in a panic, though as the Earl tries to point out there is no real need for it. The staff are excited, with the exception of Daisy (Sophie McShera fights valiantly with a couple of pretty unconvincing bolshie lines). Then members of the royal household start arriving and make it clear that they'll be running the whole show, and the resident staff had better just keep out of the way. The servants are miffed at this and plan a coup so they'll be serving the royal couple their luncheon, not the stuck-up interlopers...

Hold on. If a fleet of royal servants would swan in, offer to do my job for a day or two and tell me to curl up with a good book in the meantime - while I'd still be earning my salary - I'd be delighted. And I don't work half as hard as the servants in a manor house in late 1920s' Yorkshire. Something about the whole premise feels wonky, and the stratagems employed by the Downton staff are not overly sophisticated. It feels a little like a children's adventure in period costume. It was fun enough, but I couldn't help begrudging the time spent on this trifle of a plot and on the rest of the royal visit. Geraldine James and Simon ("Bridey") Jones are sweet as the King and Queen - even maybe a little too sweet, as this is the formidable George V and the battleaxe Queen Mary we're talking about - but we're not here to see them, or their daughter, or engage in the latter's marital woes. Yet because of them, many of the main Downton cast are pushed to the background with very little to do at all.

I do get it. Fellowes usually uses a Big Event as a kind of Christmas tree to hang different plots on, and this is the function of the royal visit here. Because of the visit, the Earl's cousin Lady Bagshaw (the Queen's lady in waiting) also visits Downton and is confronted with the Dowager; Tom Branson gets to prove his loyalty to the family once again (but we already knew we could rely on him, didn't we?); the constant struggle to keep the Downton ship afloat makes even Lady Mary question if it's worth hanging on to the monster estate; Lady Edith gets upset when the King proposes to send her husband abroad just at the time she's about to give birth; Anna clashes with a lady's maid who, unlike her, has zero feelings of loyalty towards her employer, and so on and so forth. Nevertheless, I couldn't help feeling that the most important of these stories could have been worked into the narrative in another way, without the aid of kings and queens.

Then again, the film delivers on the one front it decidedly had to deliver on for my personal part: Thomas gets a man. All right, they don't actually get together - there's no hanky-panky except for that one snatched kiss which is very chaste by Thomasian standards - but everything is set up for a clandestine love affair. What's more, it's not just an opportunistic "You like guys? I like guys! Let's make out" hook-up. Royal valet Ellis gets a chance to show he truly cares for the accident-prone Thomas and is prepared to help him out of a scrape. In the circumstances, I could not have wished for anything better for my favourite shady manservant.

There is also a rewarding storyline involving the Dowager, Lady Bagshaw, her lady's maid, Branson and Lady Merton (formerly known as Mrs Crawley), who once again acts as the voice of reason. It's nice to see Imelda Staunton, a stellar actress, playing a likeable character such as Lady Bagshaw: I suspect landing a part in the Harry Potter franchise (as the universally hated Dolores Umbridge, whose mannerisms Staunton nailed with skin-crawling accuracy) has proved to be bit of a mixed blessing for her.

I wonder how I would have rated this film if I had still been in the middle of my most fervent Downton obsession. Would I have been disappointed by the lack of core Downton storylines in favour of royal fluff? Or would I have thought: "Thomas has a boyfriend - the rest is immaterial"? I suspect the latter.